Kali River Rapids closing for 5 week refurbishment January-February 2016

[Absimilliard]

This is incorrect. If the ride runs with more than 18 rafts, then all that happens is they stack up before the station constantly, additionally causing more stacking before the drop and on the lift. This does not gain the ride any capacity. The reason the ride has huge wait times is it has several design quirks that make it very inefficient. It has the 38"-42" wrist band/additional lap bar requirement that no other Intamin raft ride has, and only some of the rafts have the required lap bar... and even if they do, only one or two lap bars are equipped. It is nearly impossible to efficiently group people into the rafts as they are all the same color and not numbered or anything so you will often see half empty rafts. The station has to stop frequently because people do not buckle their seatbelts fast enough, as well as for pulling rafts aside to the wheelchair dock. Each time the station stops, that's two or three rafts of hourly capacity lost. It also allows the Fastpass line to fill up again. More Fastpass = longer standby.

They tried to combat the frequent station stops by removing the storage bins in the rafts - people were too concerned about storing their items instead of fastening their seatbelt. Not sure if that has made any improvement or not.

Kali River Rapids has some potential, but what did WDI and Intamin think by using flexible rubber pipes and hoses to create the "rapids"?

Removing the storage bins did help, but what is funny is that all the guide books and online "touring sites" still say there are storage bins on the boats. Guests get mad at the cast members when they notice there are none now!

One interesting theory I heard is that the turntable is too small for the rafts and this is what leads to the constant stoppage and empty seats on the boats. If you look at Popeye over at IOA, Barr Engineering put a bigger turntable and they run it a little slower, helping them fill up the seats.

One fascinating thing I noticed over in Europe is that no rapid rides there have seat belts. Yes, that includes River Quest that features 3 drops and an elevator lift. The mindset (which is correct based on what has happened before in my view) is that the seatbelts are a drowning hazard in case a raft flips over and they prefer to deal with the occasional standing guest.

 

[DisneyJeff]

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Has anyone ridden Kali RR at night yet? If so, could you see any lighting enhancements?